With the advent of cable television networks and other content or communications networks, customers have grown accustomed to receiving a variety of content and services from numerous sources. In recent years, technology advances have enabled customers to receive an even greater variety of services through various networks. For example, modern cable service networks provide traditional video television programming, telephone services, high-speed Internet access, electronic mail services, video-on-demand, information services, and the like.
Unfortunately, from time-to-time, consumers of cable services experience a loss of communications with their network service providers. Losses of communications may be caused by a variety of problems. For example, a satellite downlink may be lost temporarily which causes a loss of communications across a vast service area. On the other hand, a coaxial cable may be damaged at a single home or other consumer location resulting in a loss of communications to a single consumer, or another network component, such as an amplifier, splitter, etc., may need servicing which adversely impacts downstream service and/or performance.
In order to provide quality network services and to maintain customer satisfaction, service providers must strive to restore lost communications as quickly and as efficiently as possible. Unfortunately, conventional systems and methods typically provide a network service provider with only a rough understanding of the area of lost communications, but do not provide detailed insight as to the nature of a given services outage and/or devices that are actually affected. As an example, most cable networks are inherently non-intelligent networks, many of which are based on Hybrid Fiber Coaxial (“HFC”) networks, and are, thus, unable to provide detailed network status and/or health information that would otherwise be beneficial in assessing the status and health of the networks. Various network devices that make up the network may relay the signals they receive without communicating particular details regarding their health or status. Accordingly, network performance issues on a communications network can be difficult to identify and local or systemic outages can be difficult to pinpoint. In some instances, service interruptions may result from a failure outside of the communications network, but may still cause service issues to communications network hardware. For example, a power outage can affect a significant portion of communications network devices because they are typically powered by the power network. Therefore, identifying external failures allows rapid diagnosis of service issues, improves a communications network's quality of service, and reduces unnecessary service costs.
In many circumstances, a communications network services provider may be notified that a given node servicing 1,000 homes is experiencing services outages without receiving any real-time information as to the particular locations or nature of the outages. For example, a network services provider may only learn of network failure when notified via calls from individual customers regarding particular services outages. Under such circumstances, service providers often roll multiple technicians and service vehicles to respond to a given services outage when only a single technician and service vehicle would actually be needed. Accordingly, a significant amount of time and resources (e.g., customer service representatives, field service technicians, field service vehicles, mileage, gas, maintenance, etc.) may be exhausted to resolve a single faulty network device or specific network location that was otherwise unidentifiable. In addition to the potentially massive costs, inevitable delays in service color the customer's impression of the network's reliability and the network provider's responsiveness.
Therefore, a need exists for improved systems and methods for analyzing the health of networks and identifying potential failures in communications networks or power networks.